Adenoid Hynkel
The dictator, lampooned
Chaplin's mirror held up to fascism.
Reactionary FascistOne of 729 ideologies · enter the Fascist hall →- Role
- Dictator (satire)
- From
- The Great Dictator
- Region
- Tomainia
- Social band
- Reactionary
- Placement
- +70 · +96 · −70
§ Where Adenoid Hynkel stands
3 axesTomainia's economy exists to arm its dictator. Hynkel courts inventors of absurd weapons and, needing money to invade Osterlich, seeks a loan from the Jewish banker Epstein, easing the persecution of the ghetto while he waits and resuming it when the loan is refused. Chaplin's satire shows a regime dependent on private finance and armaments, a capitalist war economy steered by the leader's whims, well right of centre.
Hynkel is absolute personal tyranny rendered absurd. Storm troopers terrorise the ghetto at his command, his ministers Garbitsch and Herring flatter and manipulate him, and crowds salute on cue as he harangues them in furious gibberish. Chaplin mocks the leader cult by showing a dictator whose power is total and whose judgement is childish.
Hynkel's regime is built on hatred of the Jews and fantasies of racial purity, and Chaplin shows its cruelty through the ghetto raids that persecute the barber and his neighbour Hannah. Its ultranationalism is mocked as empty spectacle, and the film ends with the barber, mistaken for Hynkel, appealing to the crowd for kindness, democracy and human brotherhood.
How close are you to Adenoid Hynkel?
Three statements, one per axis. Answer them and we’ll drop you on the compass next to them.
§ The story
FictionAdenoid Hynkel is the dictator of Tomainia in Charlie Chaplin's film The Great Dictator, released in 1940, a thinly veiled parody of Adolf Hitler played by Chaplin himself. Hynkel rants in mock German, persecutes the Jews of his capital's ghetto, plots to invade neighbouring Osterlich and squabbles with Benzino Napaloni, the dictator of Bacteria. Chaplin also plays the film's other lead, a Jewish barber and war veteran who looks exactly like Hynkel, setting up the mistaken identity on which the story turns.
The Great Dictator was Chaplin's first true talking picture and one of the boldest attacks on Nazism made in Hollywood while the United States was still neutral. Hynkel's dance with an inflatable globe became one of cinema's most famous images of megalomania. The film earned five Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, and Chaplin later wrote that he could not have made it had he known the full horror of the Nazi camps. It was added to the US National Film Registry in 1997.
Notable for
- 01Chaplin's 'The Great Dictator' (1940)
- 02The globe-balloon dance
- 03Satire of the strongman
Key works & moments
- 1940Charlie Chaplin's The Great Dictator premieres in New York in October.
- OpeningHynkel harangues a mass rally in furious mock German, parodying Hitler's oratory.
- Mid-filmAlone in his palace, Hynkel dances with an inflatable globe until it bursts.
- Mid-filmNeeding a loan to invade Osterlich, he eases the ghetto raids, then resumes them when refused.
- FinaleMistaken for the barber, Hynkel is arrested by his own troops while the barber speaks in his place.
- 1941The film earns five Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor.
§ Minds closest to Adenoid Hynkel
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§ Also in the Fascist hall
Enter the hall →§ Common questions
4 answersWhat is Adenoid Hynkel's political ideology?
Adenoid Hynkel is Chaplin's parody of a Nazi dictator: on the 99ideologies three-axis compass, a Reactionary Fascist. Economically he sits well right of centre (+70), running an armaments-driven war economy that depends on private finance. On governance he is at the authoritarian extreme (+96), a tyrant whose every whim is law, and socially he is strongly reactionary (−70), persecuting Jews and preaching racial purity, all of it satirised as vain and hollow spectacle.
Is Adenoid Hynkel left-wing or right-wing?
Right-wing, as a satire of the fascist far right. Hynkel is modelled on Hitler, rules through storm troopers and a leader cult, persecutes Jews, plans conquest and allies uneasily with Napaloni, a caricature of Mussolini. Chaplin made the film to ridicule fascist dictatorship, and the barber's closing speech in Hynkel's place is a plea for democracy and human brotherhood against everything Hynkel stands for.
Was Adenoid Hynkel based on Hitler?
Yes, openly so. Hynkel shares Hitler's toothbrush moustache, haranguing style and persecution of Jews, his double-cross emblem parodies the swastika, and his ministers Garbitsch and Herring lampoon Goebbels and Göring. Chaplin, born four days before Hitler in April 1889, built the film's premise on their resemblance. He later wrote that had he known the full horror of the Nazi camps he could not have made the film, but it remains one of the earliest major screen satires of Hitler.
Which minds are closest to Adenoid Hynkel?
On the 99ideologies three-axis compass, the minds closest to Adenoid Hynkel are Benito Mussolini (99% alike), Ante Pavelić (99% alike) and Ion Antonescu (99% alike). The furthest is Emma Goldman (0% alike).